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THE 



S^iSTTA^ FE TI^A^DE: 



ITS ROUTE AND CHARACTER. 



IIY 



J. EVARTS GREENE. 



Read as a part of the Report of the Council at the Semi-Annual 

Meeting of the American Antiquarian Society, 

at Boston, April 26, 1S93. 



WORCESTER, MASS. 

PRESS OF CHARLES HAMILTON, 

311 MAIN STREET. 

1893. 



07f 



^ 



•5 V 



THE SANTA FE TRADE: ITS ROUTE AND CIIAIIACTEK. 



Less than twenty years ago, a truflSc, which had been car- 
ried on for half a century under conditions unique in North 
America, came to an end, or, to speak more strictly, though 
the traffic continued, its conditions, which had been medi- 
aeval, oriental and, for this century and continent, singular, 
became modern, American and commonplace. 

The Santa Fe trade resembled that of the caravans of 
Africa and Western Asia in that it traversed a desert, or 
what was then so-called — the Great American Desert; it 
was also attended with dangers from the attacks of wild, 
marauding tribes. It differed from that, however, in the 
fact that there were no oases or inhabited stations on the 
long route, and in the contrast in the peoples and the con- 
ditions of life of the communities between which this traffic 
was conducted. At the eastern terminus was the rude, 
busy, enterprising, essentially modern and progressive life 
of our Western border, distinctively American, using that 
word, as we must so often, in default of an adjective denot- 
ing that which pertains to the United States. At the 
other end of the route, the social, industrial and political 
condition of the people was substantially unchanged since 
Spanish rule was established in Mexico by Cortes and his 
companions early in the sixteenth century, and with no 
prospect of a change for centuries to come. This remark 
applies, of course, to the conditions prevailing when the 
trade was begun and for many years afterward, but not so 
strictly to the last twenty-five years of its existence. 

To one, familiar only with the life of the Eastern States, 
who thirty-five or forty years ago visited Kansas City, 



which had then scarcely ceased to be known as Westport 
Landing, the sight of the huge wagons crowding the levee 
in early summer, with their drivers, short in stature, 
slouching in gait, dressed with a peculiar shabby finery and 
with swarthy, stolid, sinister faces, was extremely fascinat- 
ing, and suggested thoughts of romantic and mysterious 
adventure. That sight has not been seen for nearly twenty 
years. The railroad, while vastly increasing the trade, has 
transformed it into a prosaic, ordinary traffic. The Great 
American Desert has vanished. The empty waste is 
sprinkled with cities, villages and farms. The bufialo is 
nearly extinct, the Indian is no longer nomadic or preda- 
tory, and Santa Fe is, from the business point of view, 
simply a station, more or less like other stations, on a 
branch of the great transcontinental railway. 

The old Santa Fe trade has only an historical interest 
now, and in that sense it is, I trust, a proper subject for 
the attention of this Society. 

The first Europeans to penetrate to the region traversed 
by the caravans of the Santa Fe trade were Cabeza de Vaca 
and hrs three companions, survivors of the company of 
Pamphilo Narvaez. After nine years of wandering from the 
shores of Florida, they arrived in 1536 at Culiacan, near 
the Pacific coast in Mexico. It does not appear that their 
devious route crossed the line of the Santa Fe trail. It 
was probably altogether south of the latter. But the story 
which they told of rich and populous cities in the region 
north of iMexico prompted the famous expedition of 
Coronado, who, setting out from Culiacan with a large 
force of Spaniards and Indians in 1540, wandered in New 
Mexico, wintered there, apparently not very far from 
Santa Fe, and in the spring set forth again towards the 
northeast in search of the city of Quivira, of whose great- 
ness and riches he had heard surprising fictions. 

I will not discuss the disputed questions concerning the 
identity of the places mentioned by Coronado in his narra- 



tive of the earlier part of his journey. But I venture to 
offer a few suggestions in support of the opinion that its 
northeastern terminus was near that of what has been 
known in our time as the Santa Fe trail. Combining the 
account of Coronaclo in his third letter to the Emperor 
Charles V. with that of Captain Juan Jaramillo, one of his 
companions, whose itinerary is fairly definite, it appears 
that after travelling for many days across great plains, 
where they encountered marvellously vast herds of buffalo, 
and suffered much from thirst, they came, on the day of 
Saints Peter and Paul, to a river to which they gave the 
names of those Saints. Coronado briefly but graphically 
describes the prairie, which seems to have impressed him 
with awe and almost with dismay. "There is neither rock 
nor hill," he says, " nor tree nor shrub ; nothing to arrest 
the eye, which seeks in vain for a limit to those endless 
plains as if gazing at the open sea." 

They crossed the river, says Jaramillo, and advanced 
along its northern bank in a northeasterly direction for 
three days, when they came to an Indian village on a con- 
siderable affluent of this stream. The Indians resembled 
those they had before met on the plains, but were hostile 
to the latter. They ate buffalo's flesh raw, and their dwell- 
ings and clothing were made of buffalo skins, but they also 
cultivated maize. Travelling four or five days farther, 
they found successivel}^ six or seven other Indian villages 
on other affluents of the river, and at last came to a village 
whose name, they were told, was Quivira. It was not a 
rich and populous city, but a miserable group of skin huts, 
like the others. Here Coronado remained twenty-five 
days, sending out parties which explored the neighboring 
country to some extent. He was told of other villages 
farther on, on the bank of a still larger river. He says the 
latitude of this place was forty degrees ; that the country 
was well-watered by rivers, brooks and springs ; that the 
soil was rich, deep and black ; that the pasturage was 



6 

excellent ; that the Indians cultivated maize ; that there 
were plums in abundance like those of Spain, and excellent 
grapes. Jaramillo adds to these fruits, nuts and mulber- 
ries. Coronado pursued his quest no further, but returned, 
retracing for some distance the route by which he came, 
and arrived at Cicuye, whose site is supposed to have been 
some sixty or seventy miles to the eastward of Santa Fe, 
in forty days. 

When I read the account of Coronado's expedition in the 
chapter on Early Explorations of New Mexico, contributed 
by our asssociate, Mr. Henry W. Haynes, to the " Narrative 
and Critical History of America," it seemed to me that 
there could be little doubt as to the northeastern limit of 
Coronado's explorations. Coronado's and Jaramillo's de- 
scriptions of the country traversed after they arrived at the 
river named by them for Saints Peter and Paul, precisely 
tit the valley of the Kansas or Kaw River, with which I 
was once very familiar, having made the land-office surveys 
of a part of it. 

I infer that the Smoky Hill or main fork of the Kaw 
River was the river Saints Peter and Paul, because, besides 
other reasons, it is the only considerable stream flowing 
northeastward within reasonable distance of the place where 
Coronado, according to his previous and subsequent narra- 
tive, must have been. He came to the river, apparently, 
not far from the mouth of the Saline Fork, or Grand 
Saline, about sixty miles from the present site of Fort 
Riley. Following the course of the river on its north bank, 
he came, after three days or more, to an Indian village on 
a tributary of the river. Three days' journey over a level 
route would bring him to the confluence of the Republican 
Fork, where there would certainly be an Indian village, if 
anywhere. For there the blutf is high and steep on the 
north, sheltering the place below from the fierce and bitter 
winter winds. Wood is abundant ; it is almost the first 
considerable growth of timber, except cottonwood and elm, 



encountered by the traveller from the westward, and the 
bottom lands, broad and rich, required little labor to con- 
vert them into corn-fields. Continuing his journey for four 
or five days, he passed other villages in like situations, that 
is to say, on other branches of the river Saints Peter and 
Paul, and came at length to Quivira, not fiir, as I suppose, 
from the present site of Lawrence, and he was told of other 
villages beyond this on a larger river, which, if my theory 
is sound, must have been the Missouri. 

The latitude of Lawrence is about thirty-nine and one- 
half degrees. Coronado says his limit was forty. Greater 
precision could scarcely have been expected. He says the 
country was well watered with rivers, brooks and springs. 
Anyone who had occasion to travel with wagons along the 
valley of the Kaw River before the era of bridges was pain- 
fully reminded of the fact that the streams are numerous, 
and, what is unusual in a region so level, springs are many 
and copious. I well remember two, which, if Coronado 
took the route which according to my interpretation of his 
narrative he says he did, he must have discovered and 
drunk from. One is a circular basin, ten feet or more in 
diameter and four or five deep, from which a stream, two 
or three feet wide, of clear, cold water flows to the river. 
Another, some twelve miles distant, we called the Seven 
Springs. For some distance along the foot of the bluff, 
streams of bright, cool water broke through the gravelly soil, 
and these uniting formed a delightful brook, which wandered 
through the wide bottom lands, a mile and a half, to the 
river, near where the town of Abilene now is. Both these 
springs are in the open prairie, unconcealed by tree or shrub, 
and no traveller through that valley could have missed them 
or resisted the temptation to drink of their waters ; for the 
river is somewhat turbid, and its water, though wholesome 
enough, I believe, is not very palatable, having a slightly 
alkaline taste. The plums and grapes, mulberries and nuts 
are there. The quality of the plums varies much ; those 



from some trees are large, handsome and not ill-flavored. 
The grapes are abundant enough, but Coronado would not 
have written so confidently of their excellence if he had 
waited until they were ripe. The mulberries, ripening in 
June, were gone before his arrival, but Jaramillo probably 
recognized the trees. The nuts most abundant there are 
black-walnuts and pecans. 

Coronado came to this river on the days of Saint Peter 
and Saint Paul, June 29th and 30th, according to the cal- 
endar of his Church. His journey of eight days or more 
down the river and his stay of twenty-five days at Quivira 
occupied him until the second day of August or later, so 
that Castafieda, who says that they arrived at Cicuye in 
August, after a return journey of forty days, must be in 
error, and Jaramillo, who fixes the time of their leaving 
Quivira at about the middle of August, is apparently 
correct. 

The description of the province of Quivira fits the Kaw 
River country exactly. It will not fit any other nearly so 
well. Some portions of the Arkansas valley agree fairly 
M'ell with the description, but the latitude is hopelessly 
wrong. The Platte River is more than a degree farther 
north ; not so far that it need be ruled out on that score 
merely, but otherwise it is unlike Coronado's river of Saints 
Peter and Paul. It seems highly probable, therefore, that 
Coronado, though his route was not that of the Santa Fe 
trail centuries later, was the first white man who passed 
from one to the other of its terminal points. 

From Francisco Vasquez de Coronado to Zebulon M. 
Pike is a long step, not only in time, almost three hundred 
years, but in the contrast between the sonority of the name 
of the Spanish knightly adventurer and the homely quaint- 
ness of that of the American soldier. But Lieutenant, 
afterward General, Pike was as adventurous, as intrepid, 
and as skilful a leader of men as the first explorer of New 
Mexico, and more honorable, just and humane. He was 



9 

the next person of whom we have certain knowledge, who 
passed from the Mississippi Valley across the desert plains 
to Santa Fe. A vague tradition asserts that, in the eight- 
eenth century, trade was carried on to some extent between 
the French settlements on the Illinois River and New Mex- 
ico, and proof of it has been said to exist in the archives of 
the Spanish government of the province. It is said also, 
that in 1804 one Morrison of Kaskaskia sent a Frenchman 
named Lalande with goods for trade in Santa Fe, and that 
the faithless agent, having sold the goods profitably, neg- 
lected to account with his principal, lived prosperously in 
New Mexico and died there a rich man. These may be 
facts or fictions, but Zebulon Pike and his expedition per- 
tain to the history of the Santa Fe trade, though he was 
a soldier and not a trader. 

Having the year before conducted a successful expedition 
to explore the upper waters of the Mississippi, Lieutenant 
Pike was in 1806 directed by General Wilkinson to explore 
the country to the westward so far as the headwaters of the 
Arkansas and Red Rivers. Setting out from St. Louis, he 
went across the country to the Arkansas, and ascended 
that river to its headwaters, thence passed to the Rio 
Grande, some distance above Santa Fe. He built a small 
fort there, seeming to have believed that the stream was 
the Red River or one of its tributaries, and that he was 
within the territory of the United States. He was treach- 
erously enticed from his little fortress by the Spaniards, 
made prisoner and sent back by way of Mexico to the 
United States. There was an appearance of mystery in 
some parts of his conduct on this expedition, and by some 
persons it was supposed to have a connection with the 
schemes of Aaron Burr, but Pike indignantly repelled this 
suspicion. He gave an interesting account of his expedi- 
tion in his official report, in which, among other notable 
things, he writes of passing through vast herds of buflalo, 

elk and "cabri," and says he prevented the wanton 
1* 



10 

slaughter of these animals by his men, "not merely because 
of the scarcity of ammunition, but as I considered the law 
of humanity also forbade it." He would deserve to be hon- 
orably remembered for this, if for nothing else. Few of 
his fellow-countrymen in later years and in like circum- 
stances have been so merciful. Zebulon Pike, then a briga- 
dier-general, was killed in the battle near York, Upper 
Canada, April 25, 1813, just eighty years ago yesterday. 

We come now to the actual beginning of the Santa Fe 
trade ; but before treating of its history and its character 
let me give a brief description of its route. Its real eastern 
terminus was St. Louis, where the goods were purchased 
and the accounts adjusted. But the starting-point of the 
caravans was at first Franklin, a town about one hundred 
and iifty miles from St. Louis, on the Missouri River, after- 
ward Independence, one hundred miles farther up the river, 
and finally Kansas City, known for some years as Westport 
Landing, Westport being a village five or six miles south 
of Kansas City on the State line, where for a time the for- 
warding-houses were established and the caravans made up 
for their journey of eight hundred miles. The route then 
was by steamboat from St. Louis to Kansas City, and by 
wagon from that place to Santa Fe. I may add that for a 
short time during the war of the rebellion, the starting- 
point of the caravans was changed to Leavenworth, Kansas. 

Except for its lack of mountain and sea, a more beautiful 
and attractive landscape can scarcely be found anywhere, 
than that near the confluence of the Missouri and Kaw 
Rivers. In the late spring or early summer, it is especially 
charming, when the grass on the prairie is fresh and 
sprinkled profusely with flowers of many hues ; when crab- 
apple thickets, many acres in extent, are covered with pink 
blossoms, surpassing in depth of color and delicacy of fra- 
grance the bloom of our orchards ; when the mignonette- 
like perfume of the wild grape and the subtile sweetness of 
the sensitive brier, a species of mimosa, with its flowers 



11 

like purple globes, sprinkled with gold-dust, entrance the 

senses like — 

Sabean odors from the spicy shore 
Of Araby the blest. 

The oppressive monotony of the wide prairie is broken 
by gentle slopes and deep ravines, well wooded with groves 
of stately oaks and walnuts, which form promontories of 
woodland, jutting out into the open-prairie sea ; and grace- 
ful elms, tall cottonvvoods and stately sycamores adorn the 
margins of the streams. Pleasant brooks wander throush 
the valleys, and plenteous springs entice the wayfarer by 
the sparkle and murmur of their cool, sweet waters. The 
Mormons, who occupied for a time about 1833, a district 
of like character in the adjacent counties of Missouri, styled 
it the Land of Promise — the Garden of the Lord — and 
well they might. 

Not much of the route, however, was of this character. 
Leaving the Missouri at Kansas City, it followed in general 
the high prairie divide between the valleys of the Kaw and 
the Arkansas Rivers. If ease of travel were the only con- 
sideration, the summit of the dividing ridge or plateau 
would be the best route, alibrding a direct, almost level 
road, absolutely without obstructions, for more than a third 
of the whole distance. But in order to have daily supplies 
of water, it was necessary to follow along the southern 
slope of the divide, far enough below the summit line to 
intercept the tributaries of the Arkansas near their sources. 
These streams, the Marais-de-Cygnes, Neosho, Cottonwood 
and others, were encountered at suitable distances for 
camping-places, about twenty miles, more or less, being a 
day's journey. 

Of the three requisites for a camp — water, grass and 
wood — the second was scarcely ever lacking, and the third 
was superfluous after entering the buffalo range, its place 
being taken by "buffalo-chips" or dried dung, which, readily 
gathered and making a clear, hot fire, met perfectly all the 



12 

requirements of a summer-camp fuel. The route presents no 
difficulties ; the early traders had some trouble through 
losing their way, but after the trail had been established, it 
was, without the expenditure of any labor in grading or 
otherwise, a broad, well-worn highway, as distinct and 
unmistakable as any road in Massachusetts, stretching 
away for eight hundred miles without being crossed by any 
other, with no permanent habitation of man near it, and 
without a hill or ravine so steep or other obstacle so formid- 
able as to make lightening of loads or doubling of teams 
necessary. Beyond Council Grove, one hundred and forty- 
five miles from Kansas City, no timber except an occasional 
Cottonwood or elm was seen until within a short distance of 
Santa Fe. The rivers crossed were the Arkansas, Cimarron, 
Canadian and Pecos. 

Mr. Gregg, whose book entitled "Commerce of the 
Prairies," is the best authority on the early Santa Fe trade, 
says that when he made his first journey in 1831, buffaloes 
were not encountered until he had gone some distance 
beyond Council Grove. He says, also, that he never saw 
bufildoes so abundant as some travellers have represented, 
but only scattered herds, a few scores, hundreds and some- 
times thousands, and that ten years later they were "very 
sensibly and rapidly decreasing." Fifteen years later still, 
I found the eastern limit of the bufialo range as nearly as 
possible where Gregg placed it ; but, instead of finding 
them less abundant than some travellers had represented, 
their numbers seemed so vast that exaggeration would be 
scarcely possible. 

The caravans were sometimes attacked and more often 
threatened by marauding Indians, but the danger, except 
of a loss of mules or cattle by stampede, was not great. 
Gregg writes, about 1842: "In the course of twenty 
years since the commencement of this trade, I do not 
believe there has been a dozen deaths upon the Santa Fe 



13 

route, even including tliose who have been killed oft' by 
disease, as well as by the Indians." 

The first actual trading expedition to Santa Fe from the 
United States appears to have been that undertaken by 
Knight, Beard, Chambers and others in 1<S12. They fol- 
lowed Pike's route up the Arkansas and, meeting with 
no remarkable adventure, arrived duly, expecting to find 
the republic proclaimed by Hidalgo in 1810 fully estab- 
lished there. But they found the Spanish royal authority 
still recognized, were suspected of connivance with the 
revolutionists and were held as prisoners for nine years, 
until Iturbide established the republic in 1821 and set them 
at liberty. 

In that year, Bicknell and others left Franklin, Missouri, 
with a small stock of goods, intending to trade with the 
Comanche Indians on the upper Arkansas. Having heaid 
of a better market at Santa Fe, they went there, and sold 
their merchandise at a surprising profit. Until this time, 
all ojoods consumed in New Mexico which could not be 
produced there had been brought from Vera Cruz by pack 
trains, and the costs and risks of transportation were so 
enormous that conmion cottons sold for three dollars a yard 
and other manufactured goods at correspondingly high 
prices. When the St. Louis merchants learned that a 
practicable route gave them access to a market where their 
only competitors must sell at such rates, they did not 
long neglect their opportunity. 

Captain Bicknell started again the next year with a larger 
stock, which he sold to advantage, but nearly perished on 
the route, having lost his way between the Arkansas and 
Cimarron rivers. This part of the route was most 
dreaded by the early traders. The distance between the 
rivers, as the trail was finally established, was about sixty 
miles. It was the only part of the whole journey in which 
more than one day's march must be made without water. 
Mr. Gregg regards Bicknell's expedition as the beginning 



14 

of regular traffic on the Santa Fe trail. Two years later, 
in 1824, wagons were first used in this trade, the previous 
means of transport having been pack animals. It was found 
that the natural highway offered no serious difficulties to 
the wagons, and thereafter they were almost exclusively 
used. Twenty-five are said to have taken the trail that 
year, carrying merchandise valued at twenty-five or thirty 
thousand dollars. The early traders went in small parties, 
each having a few hundred dollars' worth of goods. The 
Indians at first were not hostile, and Mr. Gregg says : "It 
is to be feared that the traders were not always innocent 
of havino; instio^ated the savage hostilities that ensued in 
after years." Whether he means by this equivocal expres- 
sion that traders prompted Indian attacks upon their rivals, 
or, that some of them provoked by their insolent cruelty 
indiscriminate attacks upon all traders, does not clearly 
appear. Whatever the cause in this case, the history of 
our relations with the Indians shows that misconduct on 
one side or the other, or perhaps on both, will in such cir- 
cumstances infallibly supply provocation. For several 
years, the traders suffered considerable losses of merchan- 
dise and cattle by Indian attacks. They applied to the 
government for protection, and in 1829 and 1830 a mili- 
tary escort was furnished. After that year, the traders 
seem to have adopted the policy of protecting themselves 
by proceeding in ^arge companies with some organization, 
which they could the more readily do as the amount of 
trade rapidly increased. Each company, having, perhaps, 
forty or fifty wagons and more than one hundred men, 
chose a captain, who determined the order of march, the 
times of starting and halting, the place of encampment, and 
appointed lieutenants and sergeants, who commanded the 
guards, on which every able-bodied man was assigned to 
his share of duty. The captain had, also, a somewhat 
vaguely defined general authority, for which he commanded 
respect if he was a natural leader of men, and sufiered it to 



15 

fall into contempt if he had not the gift of inspiring fear 
and respect. Later, as the trade fell into the hands of men 
of larger capital, each of whom fitted out a train of thirty 
wagons or more, the owner or his agent took command, 
and better organization and sterner discipline were enforced. 
The volume of this trade is said to have averaged one 
hundred thousand dollars annually for the first fifteen years. 
After that it increased rapidly. Statistics, kindly supplied 
by my friend Theodore S. Case, of Kansas City, give the 
information that the first cargo of goods for the Santa Fe 
trade was landed at Kansas City in 1845, by William Bent 
and Ceran St. Vrain. In 1850, six hundred wagon loads 
went from Kansas City. In 1855, the goods shipped were 
valued at five million dollars. In 1860, the weight of the 
goods shipped from the same point was 16,439,000 pounds, 
employing in their transportation 9084 men, 6147 mules, 
27,920 oxen and 3033 wagons. The first wagons used 
were made in Pittsburg. Those used later were built by 
Murphy of St. Louis, and known as Murphy wagons. 
They were large and heavy, each carrying a load of six 
thousand or seven thousand pounds and drawn by six 
yoke of oxen or ten or twelve mules. The oxen were bred 
in Missouri, the mules in New Mexico. The drivers of the 
wao-ons owned by New Mexican traders were usually Mex- 
ican Indians, those of the Missouri traders, or of freighters, 
who supplied teams and drivers and transported merchan- 
dise at the rate of twelve or fifteen cents a pound, were 
usually "American" in the restricted sense in which that 
word was used on the frontier, or sometimes Shawnee or 
Delaware Indians. The most peculiar part of their equip- 
ment was the formidable whip, its stock a good-sized, tough 
ash or pecan sapling nearly ten feet long, with a lash some- 
what shorter, but fully two inches in diameter, ending in 
a buckskin thong. To wield this tremendous implement 
required all the strength of a man's loins. The driver did 
not flog his beasts with it, but cracked it with a heavy 



16 

flourish and a smart jerk. You would hear a sound like a 
pistol shot, and see a little mist of hair and blood start 
where the cruel thong had cut like a bullet. 

The usual day's drive was from fifteen to twenty miles. 
At the appointed stopping-place the wagons were driven 
up in such order as to form a square enclosed space or 
corral, an entrance to which could be closed by stretching 
chains across it. At halting, often early in the afternoon, 
the cattle were watered and turned out to graze under the 
charge of herders. At night they were driven into the 
corral and the entrance was closed. In the early morning 
for some hours before starting they were turned loose again 
to graze. The men camped for the night outside the 
corral, but retreated to it for defence in case of a formida- 
ble attack by Indians. 

The goods for New Mexico were cotton cloths (bleached 
and brown), calicoes, rich and showy silk shawls and dress 
patterns, millinery, bayeta (a heavy scarlet woollen fabric 
used for petticoats by the New Mexican women), sugar, 
coflee, soap, hardware, and, during the later years of the 
traffic, bottled beer, canned goods, mining machinery, and 
innumerable other things. The return cargoes consisted of 
buffalo robes, beaver and other skins and furs (collected by 
trappers and Indian traders), wool, gold from the placer 
mines thirty or forty miles south of Santa Fe, and silver 
from the mines of Chihuahua and elsewhere. The silver 
dollars, which formed a part of many return loads, were 
put up in peculiar quaint packages. The manner of pack- 
ing them is thus described in a letter from Mr. Elias 
Brevoort, of Santa Fe, who has kindly supplied me with 
much information of great use in the preparation of this 
paper: "Silver dollars were dumped in quantities of about 
five thousand into or upon a green or fresh beef-hide, and 
done up by having a rawhide rope interlaced around the 
edge of the hide and drawn up tightly. Then a fire was 
built near it so as to shrink the hide solidly to its contents 



17 

to prevent friction of the coin." These packages were as 
hard and their contents as immovable as if the metal had 
been melted and poured into a mould. 

One feature of the traffic, which gave it a speculative 
character, and perhaps added to its fascination for some of 
the adventurous traders, was the uncertainty as to the 
amount of duties which would be exacted by the Mexican 
officers of customs. The rates fixed by law were well 
enough known, but the doubt was how much of a rebate 
the officials would allow, and how much they must be paid 
for it. A convenient and generally satisfactory arrange- 
ment, said to have prevailed for some time, was that the 
trader should have one-third of the duty, the official one- 
third, and the government the remainder. Governor 
Armijo, the last Mexican governor, at one time simplified 
the customs system by imposing by his own arbitrar}' 
authority a tax of five hundred dollars on each wagon-load 
of goods, in lieu of all other duties. The immediate effect 
was to make important changes in the character of the 
goods imported and in the methods of transportation. 
Instead of wagons carrying from one to two tons each, 
which had been in use up to that time, much larger wagons, 
carrying from three to three and a half tons, were used, 
and coarse and cheap goods were omitted from the loads. 
The perverse ingenuity of the "Gringos" thus frustrated 
the purposes of the governor, and he repealed his own 
tariff, which had been made without authority, and never 
had legal force. But Mexican officers generally had few 
scruples as regards usurping legislative authority, and 
Governor Armijo fewer than most ; and the New Mexican 
[)ublic and others having dealings with its government had 
learned by experience to submit to the ruling powers with- 
out raising constitutional questions unless they were pre- 
pared for a pronunciamiento. Though Santa Fe was the 
chief market of this trade and the destination of most of 
the caravans, some traders took their goods direct to Taos, 



18 

Albuquerque, or other New Mexican towns, to Chihuahua, 
two hundred miles south, or even to Sonora, on the Pacific 
coast in Old Mexico, thus arriving at Coronado's starting- 
point. 

The men engaged in this traffic were merchants of a 
peculiar stamp, not unlike the merchants and master-mari- 
ners of New England when discoveries were yet to be made 
by sea, and pirates, or other enemies not much better than 
pirates, were likely to be encountered. They were shrewd, 
prompt and daring, knowing their market well, but not 
averse from occasional rashly speculative ventures. Some 
of these, of whose mercantile achievements, as well as of 
their personal prowess and wild adventures, traditions still 
linger among the survivors of the time when the commerce 
of the prairie had a character of its own, were of French 
extraction, notably Felix X. Aubrey and Ceran St. Vrain. 
The former is remembered chiefly for his famous ride from 
Santa Fe to Independence, unequalled, I believe, in the 
annals of horsemanship. He had wagered that he would 
ride this distance, eight hundred and fifty miles, in six 
days, and actually performed the feat in five days and six- 
teen hours, riding his own horse one hundred and fifty 
miles and trusting to chance for relays for the rest of the 
journey. This achievement was commemorated by giving 
his name to a steamboat in the Missouri River trade, which 
I have often seen, proudly bearing at the head of its flagstaff 
the gilt figure of a horseman riding at full speed. Other 
famous rides were those of Mr. Elias Brevoort, an old 
Santa Fe trader, still living, whom I have before men- 
tioned, who rode from Puerta de Luna to Santa Fe — one 
hundred and twenty miles — in sixteen hours, and from 
Dona Ana to Santa Fe — three hundred miles — in three 
days and three hours, the whole distance on one horse. 

No one was better known on the plains from thirty to 
sixty years ago than Ceran St. Vrain. Traders, trappers, 
army officers, Indians, all either knew him personally or 



19 

by reputation. Shrewd, enterprising, impetuous, choleric 
and intrepid, he was courteous and charming in manners, 
and I have been told that in his house at Santa Fe all the 
conventional observances of polite society were carefully 
regarded, even to the point of appearing always at dinner 
in correct eveninof dress. His life was full of stranije inci- 
dents and adventures, even beyond that of most prominent 
men of that region and time. He is said to have been born 
at Kaskaskia, or perhaps at Cape Girardeau, Missouri. In 
early life he entered the employment of the American Fur 
Company of St. Louis. With William Bent he established 
a trading-post in New Mexico, known as Bent's Fort, and 
another known as Fort St. Vrain. To these forts, trappers 
from all the labyrinth of mountains for hundreds of miles 
around resorted to dispose of their furs and renew their 
equipment. Kit Carson, James Bridger, Old Bill Williams, 
Vasquez and many others, the equals of these in their time, 
though their names are not rememliered, were among those 
who made these forts their rendezvous. About 1845, 
Ceran St. Vrain removed to Santa Fe, and had great suc- 
cess as a trader. 

He was one of those men about whose memory traditions 
gather, and innumerable anecdotes are told of him. Here 
is a specimen : As he was playing cards one day with a 
Spaniard, a dispute arose and the lie was given. They 
separated with the understanding that when they next met 
they would fight it out. The meeting took place in the 
street, which the general public quickly left clear to the 
combatants. Each drew his pistol, and at the first fire both 
fell. They lay in the street exchanging shots, each of 
which intiicted a wound, until their weapons were emptied, 
when they were helped to their feet, shook hands and were 
carried ofi" to have their wounds dressed. Both recovered 
and were friends, bearing no malice. Two knights of 
Richard-of-the-Lion-Heart's train would have fought out 
their quarrel with other weapons, but in much the same spirit. 



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20 



Jean Phillipe Chavez was another well-known trader of 
the same t3'pe, chiefly remembered, however, for his tragic 
fate while defending his train from the attack of a company 
of bandits from Missouri, who had organi.?;ed the raid, 
knowing that he was bringing from Santa Fe a great quan- 
tity of silver. Chavez was killed, and the robbers are said 
to have carried away treasure to the value of two hundred 
thousand dollars. 

This incident, too, has a mediaeval flavor, thou^ch it 
occurred no longer ago than 1850, I believe. Several of 
the robbers are said to have been captured and hunj^. 
This was not the only instance of the kind; indeed, the 
attacks of robbers were among the recognized perils of the 
trade. The Jameses, Youngers and Fords, whom that part 
of Western Missouri has more lately produced, were the 
legitimate successors of the border banditti of the middle 
of this century. 

It is almost as hard to fix with precision the end as the 
beginning of the Santa Fe trade in the form which I have 
tried to describe. The last train left Kansas City about 
1866, and in successive 3'^ears, the eastern starting-point of 
the caravans moved westward, following the progress of 
the railway. About fourteen years later, the locomotive 
thundered into Santa Fe and broke the spell which, for 
three centuries, had shut from the modern world, the city 
of the Holy Faith of Saint Francis. 

In closing let me express my thanks for valuable aid in 
gathering materials for this paper, to my friends of many 
years, Major Hugh G. Brown, U. S. A., and Colonel 
Theodore S. Case, of Kansas City, both of whom with me 
saw something of this trade in 1857, and to Mr. Elias 
Brevoort, of Santa Fe, who, with great kindness, though a 
stranger, put at my disposal his intimate knowledge of my 
subject. 



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